1. Field of Invention
A liner heat sealing device used to fuse two or more sheets of plastic or vinyl together along a straight line using a heating element and a temperature control unit to control the temperature of the device, the device having three separate temperature zones along a linear axis, including a front preheating segment, a central fusing segment and a rear cooling section, each section provided on the common linear sealing device.
2. Description of Prior Art
A preliminary review of prior art patents was conducted by the applicant which reveal prior art patents in a similar field or having similar use. However, the prior art inventions do not disclose the same or similar elements as the present linear heat sealing device, nor do they present the material components in a manner contemplated or anticipated in the prior art.
In U.S. Pat. No. 4,650,535 to Bennett and U.S. Pat. No. 3,106,630 to Klamp, a machine uses a lid and a flat base to fuse sheet plastic together for a shrink wrap fit and also to laminate two pieces of sheet material together to seal contents within the plastic. They are not hand held device, they do not provide three heat/cool zones on a common linear sealing device, and they do not operate using any of the components used in the present linear heat sealing device.
U.S. Pat. No. 3,477,196 to Lerner is a device used to feed, load and seal bags into proportional packages, using a linear heat seal in a closing section, this heat sealer has a fixed sealing member mounted on a seal frame, the fixed sealing member providing a hot wire energized at an appropriate time in the cycle for effecting a heat seal, with a clamp bar pressing the plastic against the heat seal. The sealed section is then passed to a cooling passage in the heat seal bar, but there is nothing mentioned about how this works, other than it is described as a cooling passage. It also mentions control circuits to operate the entire machine, as well as to time the heat sealer to operate at a given time in the cycle. The sealing occurs when the plastic is between the sealer arm and the clamp bar. These elements and operation are not common the present linear heat sealing device that is simply a plate with three segmented temperature zones that is used, very similar to a flat iron, to operate by hand, pressing the plate against plastic or vinyl heating the sheets, fusing the sheets together and cooling the fused section during a linear movement of the device along the linear axis.
A singular hand held device is demonstrated in U.S. Pat. No. 4,013,860 to Hosterman is used to weld tubing between a pair of jaws using a variable capacitor of an Rf resonant circuit. It press seal tubing, most commonly applied to tubing to provide a hermetic seal in the tubing, welding it without melting it. This is used primarily for tubing in a blood collection bag. A handle is drawn towards a body which bring a pair of jaws together. These jaws coming together applied pressure to the tubing while Rf energy heats these jaws to fuse the plastic tubing together. It operates a would a pair of heated pliers. The complex circuitry involved in the Hosterman is shown in FIG. 6. These electronic components are not involved in the present linear heat seal device and there is no pinching involved in the operation of the present device.